Reunion
by Varia Lectio
Summary: During the waning years of TarPalantir's reign, the king and his estranged brother Gimilkhad experience a carthartic, painful reunion.


Reunion

Summary: In the waning years of Tar-Palantir's reign, the king and his estranged younger brother meet in the ancient tower of Tar-Minastir.

Betaing: Thanks for betaing goes to Lexin, Araniell, and elaryn.

Author's notes: I often find the 'secondary' (or even less than secondary!) characters in Tolkien's writings to be the most fascinating to me. Their personalities are described in few words; their relationships with others are defined in broad strokes. There's a great deal of room for the fanfic author to put some shades of grey in those strokes, and to better define those shadowy characters whose actions, choices, and attitudes are tremendously important to the overall direction of Tolkien's world. Hence, this story.

Late Autumn, Year 3243 of the Second Age. . .

"What do you hope to see, brother, standing here looking out to the West?"

Tar-Palantir, King of Númenor, turned to face the other man, whose shadow had fallen across the open doorway of the Tower of Tar-Minastir. He looked Gimilkhâd up and down before finally saying, "I do not remember giving you leave to come and interrupt my meditations, Lord Gimilkhâd."

Gimilkhâd's stony grey eyes flashed in the half-darkness. For a moment he looked out to the West, where the sun set into the sea's horizon in a blaze of blood-red, then his gaze slipped back to the King. "I have matters I would discuss with you, and I found that you were absent from Armenelos-- as you usually are these days. You spend all your time in this moldering relic, looking out to sea." He laughed harshly. "Do you still hope that the Eldar will come out of the West?"

"There is always hope. Hope that our father's actions against the Faithful have not damned our people. Hope that the grace and mercies of the Valar have not departed from us utterly. For if such a day should ever come--" Tar-Palantir broke off, shuddering, then almost as an afterthought he added sharply, "And I do not like the tone you take with me. Our father may have resented the fact that I was born the elder, but it is as it is, and there is no changing the matter."

There was a soft rustle of fabric against the dusty flagstones as Gimilkhâd knelt in mocking obeisance. "Ar-Inziladûn Bar," the younger man said softly.

Tar-Palantir sighed wearily. "You mock me still. Do not call me Ar-Inziladûn... and I would that you speak Sindarin when you address me." He turned about. "I could command you to, as I am your king, but this time I will ask you, brother to brother. If you cannot comply with such a request, then you and I shall have nothing more to say. Now speak, and tell me what you came here to say."

Gimilkhâd rose and straightened his back. His eyes were hard and cold. "I had hoped to find you in your court, with the courtiers and councilors and noblemen. I had hoped to discuss with you matters that are of concern to me-- though perhaps not so to you. But--" he smiled thinly-- "I see that you are here in this moldering, half-forgotten tower, gazing out to sea, so what does it matter as to what I wish to discuss? Perhaps we should talk about why you squander your time here."

"Perhaps. But I wonder-- are you too not curious? When you look to the West, does not some secret portion of your heart, long suppressed and denied, long to see the sun shining off of bright silver-grey sails; do you not long to hear the sea-birds and the dolphins welcoming the Elven ships? Envoys have not come here for years, but still I hope."

Gimilkhâd's false smile became a sneer. "Envoys? What care I for Elven envoys, thralls and spies of the Valar? They hold us in contempt and keep from us that which is rightfully ours. Did not our ancestors war against the Shadow, and suffer greatly because of it? And what was our reward? An island and a ban. That is all."

"It is not a matter of rewards, Gimilkhâd. It is a doom. The Doom of Men--"

"Yes, doom, and for what?" Gimilkhâd's voice suddenly became a shout hoarse with helpless rage. "Doomed to fade, to wither and die like young trees caught in an early frost! And then what? Doom indeed! And what have the Elves done, to merit their immortality? Their hands are drenched with the blood of their own kin!"

Tar-Palantir barked out a short, bitter laugh. "Your words alone have assassinated me a hundred times already, Gimilkhâd. You could not do worse, not even if you took my life with your own hands."

Gimilkhâd's thin face reddened; his mouth pressed into a tight, dry line. "I am no murderer. I am a King's Man. I think only of the greater good of Númenor. The Elves would deny us lordship over the other, lesser tribes of Men with their 'benevolent' rule of Middle-earth, keeping from us the best portions thereof. They keep from us the Undying Lands, where there is no death for Men. They keep that for themselves!" A disturbing intensity-- almost a frenzy-- was in his eyes as he spoke.

"Are you so wearied already with your life?"

"No--"

"Then you lie. You weary of your days, and yet you wish to enlarge them beyond measure. You fear what is to come, and so you grasp for all that you can and desire that which is not yours." Tar-Palantir shook his head; the silver threads interwoven in his robe gleamed in the dying twilight. "I pity you, Gimilkhâd; truly I do, that you were poisoned from such a young age by the counsel of our father. You are a viper, Gimilkhâd; a viper who lies hidden in the grass to bite my heel. And your venom is more poisonous than that of any other serpent."

To this, Gimilkhâd made no reply.

"But it was not always so, that we were at odds with each other, and it need not always be so," the king said, turning about and gazing upon his brother with piercing eyes. Gimilkhâd looked aside as soon as his brother's gaze fell upon him.

"You do not remember it," Tar-Palantir continued, "but after your birth, I was allowed to come to our mother's chambers, so that I might see my brother. I held you in my arms when you were not even a day old. I loved you, Gimilkhâd, for I saw that my mother was happy as well. You and I both know that she bore no affection for our father, but she loved us, all the same. And she loved you as much as she ever loved me."

He stepped forward, reached out, and grasped Gimilkhâd's shoulder-- not roughly, but gently. More gently then the other man had expected; Gimilkhâd flinched, then looked up with a hard face and glittering eyes. They had not touched nor even come this close to each other since childhood.

"I remember... when I was a boy, how happy I was at the thought of a younger brother," the king continued. A strange smile, born of pain and recalled happiness, touched Tar-Palantir's normally unsmiling mouth; his eyes creased at their corners as tears formed. "I thought of all the things I could teach my young brother-- horsemanship-- do you remember, Gimilkhâd, how I helped you pick out your first pony?"

Gimilkhâd stared at Tar-Palantir as though he saw a ghost from the past, or as if he had never truly seen his brother at all before this moment. After a while he nodded. "Yes, I remember... she was black all over, save for a white spot on her forehead, shaped like a diamond. And so..." he laughed hoarsely, "I named her Mirikarbi."

"Which was a mixture of two languages, as Father pointed out," Tar-Palantir said. "And Mother said that the name was beautiful, but that it must be changed."

"What else could she say?" Gimilkhâd said, his brow creasing as he frowned.

Tar-Palantir shook his head. "In that, you are right. Do you remember how I helped you learn Sindarin and Quenya? That was secret work, but you seemed to enjoy your lessons. I remember how you smiled..."

Gimilkhâd pulled away, stiffening at the mention of the Elven tongues. When he spoke again, his voice had lost its momentary warmth. "Yes-- but it was forbidden, as you and Mother well knew." He exhaled a long breath and looked down at the floor. "The lessons stopped after Father found out."

"And he did not let me tutor you again," Tar-Palantir said quietly. "We barely even saw each other, due to his will. Now we are brothers in name and bond of blood only-- not brothers in spirit, as we should have been."

Gimilkhâd sighed, seeming to shrink down inside his long, heavy robes; he stooped as if the weight of life was almost too much to bear. His face was lined and pale, and the cold anger and seething jealousy was gone from his features. Now he looked profoundly tired; tired of estrangement, wearied with loneliness in the prison he had made for himself.

Tar-Palantir kept his gaze upon his younger brother, for the gaze of the king was one that few men could withstand if they had done some evil thing, be it hidden or no. Even Gimilkhâd, when he rose up to speak against Tar-Palantir in the royal court, could hardly utter an accusatory word when his brother's eyes were upon him.

But now that gaze was not accusatory, nor unkind. It was unexpectedly tender.

"I said once before to you that I would prefer you speak to me in an Elven tongue, Gimilkhâd. I said that I could demand it of you as your king, but that I would merely ask it of you, as a brother. Now, I am going to offer you a royal pardon for any crimes, any sedition, any slander, that you might have spread about me. For I know, Gimilkhâd, that you have opposed me bitterly, both in secret, and openly amongst the people."

Gimilkhâd swallowed and looked away quickly.

"But I shall do much, much more than that. Do not think that after I have pardoned you, I would cast you from the court! I would pardon you as a king... but I would forgive you, as a brother." He released Gimilkhâd. "I ask only that you think on this, brother. Our people will not be saved by Elven ships coming out of the West-- we are too far gone for that. Not even if the Valar themselves descended upon our shores would Numenor be healed of her wounds. The healing must come from within. We must all repent of our prideful desires and ambitions, and turn with humility and thankfulness to the One, as we did before. No happiness can be known, in your heart or in mine, until this is done."

At this, Gimilkhâd stepped away, leaning against the wall, looking out to the West. His eyes were shining; tears were on his cheeks. "But there is no salvation to be found here, nor anywhere. Perhaps there are no Valar to care for our plight," he said hoarsely after a long while. "In the West there is only the Ban, and in Númenor there is now only death. Madness. Killing in the streets!" He looked at his brother with a child's frightened eyes. "Disease that takes the young and the old alike. And the line of Elros sickens and dies ever sooner, so that our years wan with each king who ascends to the throne. Our glory is fading." He swallowed heavily. "Just as the sun in the West fades. No, repentance will not bring healing, Inziladun. We must--" He stopped, running a hand through his gray hair. His eyes were shadowed, and his gaze moved about, never resting for long on any one thing. "I do not even know the answer myself, when all these years I thought I had it. Now I grasp only dust, and my life fades away on a breeze out of the West." He shuddered. "And what then will there be for me? Darkness."

There was silence for a long moment as the two men, enemies caught in a fragile truce of memories and emotions, studied each other. At last Tar-Palantir said softly, "And I recall that as a child you were afraid of the dark, as well."

Gimilkhâd shivered and nodded reluctantly. "And it is so dark now, brother. . . . But I must be leaving now. I feel weary." He ducked his head and pulled his hood up. The cowl's dark, thick fabric shadowed his face and made his already pallid skin look sickly white. "Good night."

"Good night, brother," Tar-Palantir said softly. He reached for his brother one last time, but Gimilkhâd had already slipped away and was walking down the tower's broad, lantern-lit steps. Tar-Palantir watched the other man move away until the darkness swallowed him.

"Good night," the king whispered one last time, and then Tar-Palantir himself left the tower of Tar-Minastir to stand silent and black against the starry sky, with the sea pounding against the stony bluffs far, far below.

The End


End file.
